


UBRary OF CONGRESS 

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Emerson Series No. 9 March, 1918 



THE WESTERN ALLIES 
THE NEAR and the FAR EAST 

IN 

THE WORLD WAR 



WORTHY and UNWORTHY 
ALLIANCES 



By 
HARRINGTON EMERSON 



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THE WESTERN ALLIES 

THE NEAR and the FAR EAST 

IN THE WORLD WAR 

jfi. WORTHY and UNWORTHY 
ALLIANCES 

SOME men have the rare gift of uttering 
in simple fashion world truths. 

When I met Mr, Norval A. Hawkins, 
Commercial Manager of the Ford Motor 
Company, he outlined in sequence on each 
uplifted finger of his left hand the five requi- 
sites that any young man seeking a position 
should insist on in the employer, before sign- 
ing up. 

Because the young are so eager to get 
started, because there are so many careless as 
to what, if there is only a promising salary, it 
is usually assumed that any employer if he 
offers the price can find applicants for an\ 
position. This is not as it should be, and any 
young or older man should be at least as care- 
ful about the position he accepts as he is about 
the quality of the eggs and butter he eats, or 
about the immaculateness of his linen. Solo- 
mon said: "Evil communications corrupt 
good manners." Also the Japanese reformer 
Hideyoshi, a little Samurai country boy of the 
t6th Century, knew the great importance of 
choosing the right overlord. At that time the 

[31 



condition of Japan was similar to what Mexi- 
can conditions have been during the last five 
years. Hideyoshi resolved to regenerate 
Japan. 

His first step was to visit and study all the 
Japanese feudal military chieftains and to 
select the one he thought most likely to prove 
a skilful leader. In order to secure a position 
with the right man, he willingly accepted a 
start at the very bottom. Hideyoshi did regen- 
erate Japan and died as supreme ruler, one of 
the most interesting characters in all history. 
He had ultimate rather than immediate ideals, 
he knew how to identify himself with good 
men. 

Mr. Hawkins' five requisites: 
(i) "Is the employer, whether individual or 
company, high class and honorable, up- 
right and trustworthy? A high moral 
basis is the foundation for everything 
worth while." 
(2) "Is the business high class and one with 
which it is a satisfaction and pleasure to 
be connected?" 

No self respecting man can be very proud 
of being a saloon keeper or a garbage in- 
cinerator, or manager of any other dis- 
tasteful and unpleasant business. I re- 
member the scorn Kipling poured out on 
the Omaha undertaker. 
[4] 



(3) "Is the prospective employer financially 
strong?" 

There are many good men engaged in 
noble and fine activities, but they are 
nevertheless financially weak and almost 
foredoomed to failure. Do not connect 
with them! 

(4) "Has the prospective employer the equip- 
ment, the establishment, to carry out the 
plans?" 

A wise man planning fruit raising, even if 
very wealthy, is doomed to failure if his 
land is in the late frost belt. 

(5) "Has the prospective employer the sales 
organization which will enable him to 
keep going?" 

A fine man might have invented a very 
good typewriter. He might have abun- 
dant wealth and have erected a big fac- 
tory to build well made machines. Hun- 
dreds of such undertakings have failed 
because there was not an adequate sales 
organization to put the product over. 



If, however, said Mr. Hawkins, a prospec- 
tive employer is ethically sound, if the busi- 
ness is one to inspire enthusiasm, if there are 
abundant finances, if there is good equipment, 
and if there is a fine sales organization, then 

[5] 



let the young man or the old man get in, stay 
in and become a worth while part of the whole. 



Mr. Hawkins, as to an every day matter, 
was consciously using worldwide wisdom. 

Since then, as I have pondered his remarks, 
I have thought how well they applied to the 
selection of a husband by a woman. 

Is the man ethically high class? Is his pro- 
fession or business one that inspires enthusi- 
asm? Is he reasonably safe financially? Is he 
physically sound? Can he market his value? 

If he has these qualities it is safe to fall in 
love with him. If he is lacking in any one of 
the five, there are shoals and rocks ahead. 

But Mr. Hawkins' precepts, because they 
are world wisdom, apply also to the greatest 
world events, especially to the alliance between 
the democratic western powers — France and 
Great Britain on the one side and autocratic 
Russia and modern Japan on the other side. 

How did the autocracy of Russia check up 
as an ally? Did the profligate aristocracy and 
the grafting bureaucracy which controlled 
Russia in 1914 make Russia a trustworthy and 
worth while ally? They did not. 

Did Russia have a worthy cause? 
Desire for Constantinople and desire to 
regulate Balkan affairs were not noble ambi- 

[6] 



tions whose realization would have promoted 
either the welfare of peoples or the peace of 
the world. 

Was Russia financially strong? She was 
not. She had already drained France of her 
savings, and, owing to bad government and 
worse administration, her area of enormous 
natural wealth was inhabited by a poverty 
stricken and ignorant population. 

Was Russia well equipped? She was not. 
Her vast levies were unsupplied with guns, 
munitions, clothing. Her supposed vast mili- 
tary strength collapsed, but not because men 
did not courageously die. Anybody who had 
followed the Japanese Russian war knew 
Russia would collapse in any conflict with 
Germany. Could Russia put over what she 
promised? Was she able to be the hammer, 
driving onto Berlin, while the Allies served 
as anvil in the West? She could not. She could 
not deliver her great strength. 

In combining with Russia the allies lost 
standing morally with the neutrals of the 
world. How insincere to denounce the Hohen- 
zollerns, yet climb into the same bed with 
the Romanoffs! 

Therefore, one of the greatest causes that has 
come up for decision in the history of nations 

[7] 



has been damaged because, under temptation, 
fundamentals were waived. 

On grounds of immediate expediency the 
Allies tied up to Russia and in so doing, they 
made a world mistake, for this is a war in 
which ultimate truths are at stake, and the 
ultimate cannot, with impunity, be sacrificed 
to the immediate. 

Autocratic Russia was fit ally neither for 
republican France, nor for democratic Great 
Britain. Was it not quite as much the fear of 
what France and Great Britain would grant 
this ally Russia, as German intrigues, that 
drove Turkey into the war on the wrong side? 

We can be sympathetic with Russia in the 
belated throe of a revolution carried out in 
England in 1649, in France in 1789. We can 
give her struggling people all possible sup- 
port, but above all, we must beware lest again 
for the sake of delusive expediency, the Allies 
make any combine with the Bolsheviki. 

On the other hand how does Japan loom up 
as an Ally? 

What are the answers when we ask the five 
questions as to Japan? 

Is Japan worthy? What people in modern 
times can show the great and remarkable 
emergence of Japan? 

[8] 



Three strong modern nations were making 
history in the same decade. 

The United States settled one great question, 
the permanence of a free nation, by a long, 
bloody and costly war and a long period of 
most unskilled reconstruction from which the 
South began successfully to emerge about 
thirty years after the end of the civil war. 

Prussia during the same years was establish- 
ing her ruthless, military dominance, sacrific- 
ing Germany, overthrowing her neighbors, 
preparing, oh, most skillfully to betray the 
Christian ideals, western civilization, the white 
race, to set back humanity itself. 

The young emperor of Japan, a boy of six- 
teen had during this same period the ideal of 
leading his people up to the foremost position 
in modern civilization. 



What did Japan do? 

She sent her best of youth to study and learn 
in Europe and America, to adopt, to adapt 
and to become adept in all the experiences and 
wisdom of the western, white and Christian 
world. 

As any proud and honorable nation would, 
she chafed under the ignominy of the extra 
territorial consular courts, and won their 
abolition. 

19] 



Little Japan defeated the great but weak 
colossus of China, little Japan astounded the 
world by defeating the armies and navies of 
Russia. Growing Japan built mills and fac- 
tories and rapidly rose to a position of the first 
rank, always, with the old Japanese honor, 
strictly adhering to the sacredness of given 
word of pledge, of treaty. 

Has Japan honorably worked as an ally? 
She has. 

Did Japan have noble ideals? She did and 
they were: 

To discover the secrets of the universe, to 
stay its diseases, to subjugate it for the benefit 
of humanity. To lead again up into the light 
the great yellow race which has supplied the 
world with so many of its leaders. To take 
first rank herself among the civilized nations 
of the world and to establish as to Eastern 
Asia a Monroe Doctrine of the far East for 
the oriental. 

Japan's aims were high and worthy, and we 
of the United States were her best friends and 
greatest admirers until insidious German 
propaganda tried to and, to our shame, suc- 
ceeded in arousing distrust. 

Did Japan have the brains, the money and 
the men to warrant great enterprises? She did. 

Did Japan have ready armies, well equipped 
[10] 



manufacturing plants, did she have a fervently 
industrious civil population? She had them 
all. 

Did Japan deliver what she promised? She 
was the first, and alas the only one of the Allied 
powers to date to achieve signal victory over 
the Prussians, shattering for all time their 
lustful plans of oriental conquest 

Japan supplied Russia with both money and 
munitions. 

Because Russia initially showed weakness 
on every one of the five tests, because Japan 
initially and continuously has shown growing 
strength on every one of the five tests let us 
go ahead with no more illusion as to present 
Russia or future Russia, let us go ahead with 
faith and trust in those whose fifty years of 
modern history have earned trust, faith and 
admiration, and let the East and the West fight 
this war to a finish, not for immediate, not 
even for proximate, but for ultimate welfare. 
That ultimate is not the exaltation of any one 
nation, or of any one race or of any one re- 
ligion, but for the glory of high ideals, for 
peace on earth and for good will toward men. 

HARRINGTON EMERSON. 



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